Facebook,the service,is old-fashioned,and Meta likely needs to set itself up for a future where it disappears. By investing in a social virtual world powered by nascent technology like AR and NFTs,it hopes to place itself where the kids of today will be in a few years,rather than where their parents were in 2007.

Meta’s path ahead will not be a smooth one. Rights advocates and regulators are unlikely to let the company forget about its impacts on democratic processes,or its role in the dissemination of hateful content and misinformation.